Four Voices sing in harmony for justice

In 1963, Joan Baez sang “We Shall Overcome” alongside Martin Luther King at the March on Washington. Forty-four years later, she sang at January’s Women’s March. The topics were similar: people need to be kind and empathetic, but also forceful in speaking out against injustice.

Baez will bring that message to the Fraze Pavilion in Dayton Thursday when she’s joined by Mary Chapin Carpenter and the Indigo Girls, Amy Ray and Emily Saliers, on their Four Voices tour. The quartet originally sang together in 1991 at a benefit for Baez’s Humanitas organization and performed again when Baez when inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in April.

They also played together last year at Baez’s 75th birthday celebration, an event that also featured Emmylou Harris, Jackson Browne, David Crosby, Mavis Staples, Richard Thompson and Paul Simon.

The Fraze show is the fourth on the 10-date tour that started at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville last week and ends June 17 in Boston.

Simon plays PNC Pavilion Saturday

Paul Simon proved he’s still a songwriting force with last year’s “Stranger to Stranger” album, but he comes to town for a sold-out show Saturday with his own social message: Science is real and Earth needs everybody’s attention.

Simon has been more understated about causes than many of his contemporaries like Baez and Bob Dylan, but was moved to action by E.O. Wilson’s book, “Half-Earth: Our Planet’s Fight for Life.” Proceeds from the 18-date June tour will go to Wilson’s Biodiversity Foundation.

The financial commitment doesn’t mean that fans will have to sit through a science lesson. He told Mongabay, a conservation website, “It’s a concert of music … I don’t want people to come and think they’re going to be lectured to. But I don’t mind having Ed’s book (for sale).”

While “Stranger” proved that Simon writing is still sharp at 75, his first performance on “Austin City Limits” last fall showed that he continues to enjoy playing live as well. Of course, it doesn’t hurt to have a top-notch band of international players, but someone of Simon’s caliber understands that entertainment and enlightenment are not mutually exclusive.

Bare Jr. makes first of two visits

The eclectic Bobby Bare Jr. shares at least two things with his famous father (the writer of “Detroit City” and “500 Miles from Home”): a name and a love for music. It would have been easy to follow the family footsteps, but that’s not what artists do. Instead, Jr. has carved a career as a singing-songwriting bandleader (Bare Jr., Young Criminals Starvation League), raucous solo artist and documentary film subject (“Don’t Follow Me I’m Lost”).

Last year, Bare Jr. made the perfect Bare Jr. move when he joined Guided By Voices as a guitar player in the rotating cast of Robert Pollard’s 40-years-plus sonic experiment. Bare Jr. will be in town twice in a little more than two months: Thursday night at MOTR Pub, then Aug. 16 with GBV on the other side of Main Street at the Woodward Theater.